Nikolaj Coster-Waldau in ‘An Optimist’s Guide to the Planet’.Photo:Chris Goll
Chris Goll
Nikolaj Coster-Waldaubecame famous across the globe as the dashing yet complicated Jaime Lannister onGame of Thrones, but nowadays the actor is more concerned with thefuture of Earththan drama in the Seven Kingdoms.
“If you look just 50 years back at all these issues — gender equality, eliminating extreme hunger, access to education, LGBTQ rights, civil liberties — we are in a whole so much better today than we were 50 years ago,” Coster-Waldau, 53, tells PEOPLE at the premiere of his new docuseries,An Optimist’s Guide to the Planet, at the Museum of Modern Art in New York City on Jan. 31. “And there’s a lot of work to do, but we are doing so much better.Climate change, we’re not. We have to do better but we can and we will.”
“The series captures Coster-Waldau and his team as they criss-cross the globe exploring humanity, witnessing its power for good, and learning about some of the remarkable solutions (both old and new) that inspire his optimism for the future,” reads Bloomberg’s description of the project. “On their journey they visit: Greenland, Australia, United States, Japan, Vietnam, Germany, Kenya, St. Vincent, Spain, Mexico, The Netherlands and Switzerland.”
Nikolaj Coster-Waldau at the Jan. 31 premiere of ‘An Optimist’s Guide to the Planet’.Rob Kim/Getty Images for Bloomberg Media
Rob Kim/Getty Images for Bloomberg Media
In total, the Emmy-nominated actor visited 15 different countries to film his new project. And while he had a blast, it wasn’t all a smooth ride.
“I got quite sick,” he says of his ailments, which includedseasicknessand some alarming rashes he has a sense of humor about in the first episode. “I like people and I like to meet people. And of course, I was shaking a lot of hands, and I mean a lot and I picked up a lot of [germs]… I got to say quite a bit. But listen, that’s part of it. And I would never want to hold back.”
“It’s this journey where you get to see this world,” he adds. “You get to experience places that you’ve never gone to before… We have some great moments.”
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The goal of the 5,000-acre community is to conserve wildlife, reverse poverty and preserve culture with a holistic approach.
Nikolaj Coster-Waldau in ‘An Optimist’s Guide to the Planet’.Chris Goll
Coster-Waldau hopes that viewers will find inspiration in the places and people he visits in the show to counter pessimism resulting from heartbreaking headlines on theclimate crisis.
“Everywhere, people are coming up with new ideas, new solutions, new ways of approaching problems,” he says. “It has to give you hope.”
“I refuse to believe that we are so stupid that we’re going to destroy the only planet we have,” he adds. “We’re not.”
Part of what drives Coster-Waldau is wanting to protect the planet for future generations.
“I’ve shown [my children] bits and pieces, and they’re very excited,” he says of his daughters Safina, 20, and Fillippa, 23, whom he shares with wife Nukaaka, 52.
“I know they both have dreams of maybe having kids one day,” he says, “and so they don’t have that kind of negative outlook or fear of the future, which I’m very happy about because I think there’s nothing worse than fear.”
source: people.com
